Sam Pittman was already on the hot seat prior to his press conference on Thursday afternoon. However, the college football coach at Arkansas further dug his own grave around him with a passionate defense of his program’s NIL budget as a mass exodus to the transfer portal continues.
His rationalization completely backfired.
Pittman, 63, just completed his fifth regular season as the head coach of the Razorbacks. He has won two less games than he has won. Arkansas is 10-14 in the last two years.
Even though there were loud calls for Pittman to be fired over the last few months, athletic director Hunter Yurachek decided to give him one more shot. The decision has already proved costly.
More than 25 players have entered the transfer portal since the beginning of December. A large number of them are trending toward other Southeastern Conference programs. Top offensive lineman Patrick Kutas committed to Ole Miss on Friday.
Fans in Fayetteville are fed up. A large amount of Razorbacks wanted Pittman gone before his roster completely imploded. That number has only increased over the last seven days. They even leaked Yurachek’s phone number to bombard him with texts asking him to fire their lame duck head coach.
Meanwhile, Pittman was asked to explain why so many players are leaving. He made it abundantly clear that NIL funds are not the problem. Arkansas is not getting out-bid by programs with more money.
On one hand, it is very good news that the Hogs are able to compete financially. On the other hand, it is very bad news that money cannot keep current players in the system.
Arkansas lost approximately one quarter of its roster to the transfer portal even though the players who left are not getting more money to play elsewhere. They just wanted to leave to leave.
